(Bloomberg) -- Frances O'Grady, Britain's most senior trade union leader, revealed she's only met Theresa May once since she became prime minister -- and said she had a better relationship with the chancellor of Germany.
“I have met Theresa May once,” O'Grady, the general secretary of the Trades Union Congress, told journalists in London on Tuesday. “I have in the past sometimes reflected on the fact that I have met Angela Merkel, the president of Ireland, various others, many more times than our own prime minister.”
May's reluctance to meet O'Grady is an example of the premier's unwillingness to engage beyond her Conservative Party, even though she lacks a majority in Parliament. May's spokesman, James Slack, told reporters that she met industry figures regularly.
O'Grady urged May to pursue a Brexit settlement that reflected the closeness of the 2016 referendum result. “As a union officer, if I got a ballot result that was 52-48 in terms of my membership, I would be very, very careful about what I did next,” she said. “The last thing I'd want to do is split my membership.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Robert Hutton in London at rhutton1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Flavia Krause-Jackson at fjackson@bloomberg.net, Stuart Biggs, Mark Williams
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